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So… I realize it’s now June, and therefore a few months since I’ve posted anything that I wrote myself and didn’t drag out of my male contributor… Whose last post’s poll only got ONE response by the way. I’m looking at you. All of you. Because I know more than one person read it and I’m pretty sure that one person who responded was my BOYFRIEND who did it out of pity and not because he wants to know how to tell if a guy is a douchebag.

I’ve been crazy busy on the one hand, which isn’t much of an excuse because we all have. Graduating, moving back home, getting a job and an internship, and getting ready for (real) life. I’ve also just had really unfortunate timing. Words always come to me when I’m in inconvenient places. Like meijer. or in the shower. Then by the time I get to my laptop I’m either too tired or have forgotten the eloquent prose (ha) that so beautifully came to me.

I guess you’re just going to have to settle for the non-prose version.

I feel like I’m on a roller coaster ride of emotions- some days I am SO happy with my life: college graduate, job with awesome kiddos, awesome boyfriend who I’ll probably get engaged to within the next 2 years (PRESSURE. haha, I can’t help it… I’m in the wedding business now with my internship- it’s hard not to start planning my own! Sorry T! I love you!), said mentioned wedding internship, back home where it just feels oh so right to be right now, loving family who accepts and supports me no matter what, etc. I am a very lucky girl. Other days I have a complete meltdown because I’m worried I made a big mistake in my career path and should’ve just gone to school to be a lawyer or nurse or something. First world problems, I realize, when you take a step back and look at it. How are you guys dealing with graduation (for those of you who have graduated)?

There was a point right after I found out I got my internship though when I got especially worried- worried that something would go very very wrong soon. Why? Because it usually has. To round up the pity party, there has been many occasions in my life growing up where things would seem to be awesome for 5 seconds until they weren’t. Super cute guy likes you? Jk he has a girlfriend. Wow, these girls are awesome and seem to get me… JK they talk about you behind your back and secretly hate you. It’s your senior year and theatre is your life and you’ve worked your butt off for four years so you think you finally have a shot at a non-chorus role in the school musical? HA. Don’t even get me started.

I came up with this theory in high school: Out of the three things I wanted/needed most in life- best friends, involvement in something I feel passionate about (whether a school play, job, or something else), and a positive relationship with a boy, I could only ever have two, at most. The two years between my junior year of high school and my freshman year of college I swiveled between the three at a sickening pace. I would say that I am the closest right now that I have ever been, and I am so grateful and thankful for that.

I am also thankful that I have got a hold on my rOCD (you can read more about what that is here: http://relationshipocd.com, if you guys want I can do a whole blog post about my experience with rOCD sometime) and am now able to see T for what he is- a wonderful, wonderful man. I am so glad you guys got to go on that journey, at least a little bit, with me and I can stand here today and say I made it. Not every day is a good day, but thanks to positive/realistic thinking, and the journey that I took to get here I can say that the bad days are few and far in between. I have confronted my demons and relationship fears, something we all have to do at some point. I have realized that a boyfriend is a person, and therefore a human, like myself, and not perfect. I have realigned my expectations for what I NEED a boyfriend/future husband to be and not what I WANT him to be and I am so excited for my future with T. 🙂

I realize this post probably wasn’t very interesting, so I will try to work on something better for the near future, but at least you have an update now. A big thanks to all of you: for reading hugs & the suburbs and for your encouraging words. Stay tuned for the future. 🙂

WordPress just notified me that it has been one year since I made my blog.

I can’t help but reflect on all that has happened within this past year. T and I broke up and got back together. I made the decision not to continue with my sorority. I finished my junior year and got a summer internship. I learned so much in my internship and had a wonderful summer going up north to the beach and going out with friends and spending time with T. I started my senior year and got a part time job working with babies that I LOVE.

Now I have about 13 weeks until I graduate from college and am done with school FOREVER! (or at least until or unless I go to Grad school, which is yet to be decided)

I am so different than I was a year ago- I’ve grown so much. I’m also completely different than when I first started college, which seems like a day ago yet feels like an eternity. I remember thinking my campus was so big I could never find my way around and making new friends on my floor felt so scary and new. I remember not really knowing who I was- I was in a sort of limbo. No longer the girl in high school who was obsessed with theatre, the boy with the grey eyes, and avoiding sports at all costs. I was a theatre major for a hot second, but then I didn’t know where to go from there. I never thought I’d find a guy that I was attracted to, could make me laugh, and wasn’t going to break my heart every second. I was still learning the world didn’t revolve around me, but was also figuring out who I wanted to be.

Today, I have so many ambitions. I want to do so many things to help children, women, and families. I want to make a difference in my community. I am in love, and for once in my life actually know what this means. I’m no longer searching for some mythical prince charming that doesn’t exist, but now understand what matters in the long run- something that I don’t think many girls my age understand yet. Finding the guy that pulls a splinter out of your foot, that would never make you wonder if he’d cheat on you, and wants to be a husband and a father as much as you want to be a wife and a mother is a rare and beautiful thing. I’m so excited to travel the world and live in different places and chase my dreams and watch my children’s eyes light up on christmas morning and do it all while sharing my life with someone that loves me, truly.

So where am I today?

In a much, much better place.

I started this blog hoping to share my story. Hoping to find out somewhere between my stupid jokes that no one gets and the too many gifs that I am actually ok. That my life is where it’s supposed to be, and that the things that used to matter so much- like getting the lead in the school play or having a cute date to the homecoming dance, don’t mean anything in the long run. There’s no one to tell me I’m doing it right, and that was very scary to me for a long time. I was constantly wondering if I’d met the “one,” over-thinking my career choices, and questioning myself as a person. I finally know that it’s all ok, to trust myself, and believe in what I deserve. And that, in itself, is a miracle.

I don’t know if I will continue my blog after graduation- I might go back to rarely posting or I might cease entirely. It’s yet to be decided, but I’m ok with that.

Then: senior picture in high school Now: confident senior in college. sort of.

Today I had my graduation check, which is when you make sure you have all your classes completed or currently enrolled in in order to graduate. As I sat there watching my advisor check off all the little boxes I couldn’t help but remember when it had seemed nearly impossible. My freshman year each major had seemed like it required much more than four years of classes- there were just so many requirements to graduate. Now 3 years and 96 credits later I am so much closer.

It made me think about all the other things in life we feel we need to get checked off. boyfriend, check. bachelor’s degree, check. job I like, check.

So often we are trying to cross off all the boxes in life, but the harsh reality is, if we wait until all our boxes are checked our lives may never begin. The qualifications and goals don’t go away after we complete them, they just change. They are never ending, and a part of us is always striving for them, worried that if we don’t check them off we’ll end up alone living with a ton of cats and a job we hate. have a relationship- check. Then get engaged- check. Then get married- check. Have kids- check, check, check.

There is no easy formula to happiness, and no one’s list of life goals is the same. Some of us want to be CEO’s of big modern-day up & coming companies, while others want to help orphan’s in another country. Neither is more important than the other, because they both need to be done. Not everyone has what it takes to be a CEO, and not everyone has the strength to help those less fortunate. Everyone must find their own passion, their purpose, and their “graduation pathway.”

Imagine you are 25, happily married, with 2 kids, a house, and your dream job that also pays well. The ideal perfection of the American dream.

“I’d feel pretty darn awesome,” You’d say, thinking how cool it would be if you had your life figured out that early.

But besides being pretty much impossible, you’d still want more. Our complicated brains constantly come up with new goals for us, and just because we complete them doesn’t mean we’ll stop there. Completing something doesn’t necessarily mean lifelong happiness and satisfaction, because it’s not the end of your journey. It’s just the start of a new checklist. We are never “done,” We create dreams and goals for ourselves because if we didn’t our lives would be boring. Have you ever felt that loss of purpose? After completing something that consumed so much of your time you wondered, “what now?” ….So you start another project. We’re always wanting more… more money, more time, more dates, when will it be enough? We have to stop being greedy, and find a happy medium. Be thankful for what you have, who you are at this point in your life, and all that you have achieved. But never stop reaching for your dreams.

When you cross off all your boxes, make new ones. When the qualifications and boxes seem as if they are impossible- keep trying. At the start of a journey it can seem as if the way there will take forever.. but then you blink, and you’re 21, in a committed relationship, and graduating from college in the spring.